I created this factoring vs distributing card sort activity to show my Algebra 2 students that factoring isn’t something to be afraid of. By the time they get to Algebra 2, the distributive property is something they should hopefully be able to do in their sleep.
So, I wanted them to see that factoring out the GCF was just a way to undo the distributive property.
First, students had to complete a card sort activity and sort the cards into FACTORED and DISTRIBUTED. Once they were sorted, we glued them in our notebooks in two columns.
If a card was factored, we wrote in the distributed version. If the card had been distributed, we factored out the greatest common factor.
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Factoring Distributing GCF Card Sort (PDF) (936 downloads )
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